DIRECTOR MARYO J. DE LOS REYES chose to film his FDCP entry “Bamboo Flowers” in his native Bohol. “We were encouraged to shoot in our home province,” he says. “Chito Rono shot in Samar, Mel Chionglo and Gil Portes in Quezon, di ako naman sa Bohol. But I didn’t know what story to do. To seek inspiration, I went to church and at the end of the mass, they sang ‘Give Thanks’. When I heard the lyrics, ‘When the weak say I’m strong and the poor say I am rich’, I realized it must be the theme of my movie. Bohol is so beautiful, so many tourists visit it, but its people mostly take up courses like nursing, maritime, HRM, so they can go abroad. Then, while on a boat in Abatan River, I saw these chandelier-like flowers hanging from bamboos. Yun pala ang bamboo flowers and when a bamboo tree sprouts them, this means it will soon die. I asked my scriptwriter, Aloy Adlawan, to stay in my place for two weeks and interview the Boholanos. He came up with four stories. Sabi ko, we’ll just use three kasi kung four, masyadong mahaba na ang movie baka matalbugan ko pa si Lav Diaz sa haba. The first story is about children, then about teenagers, then about young adults. They’re intertwined with each other.”
The story about children stars Mylene Dizon as a young mom whose husband died in Manila so she takes her son home to Bohol to start a new life. But the boy, Yogo Singh, rebels as he doesn’t like being uprooted from the city to live in a rural environment. The story about teeners stars Irma Adlawan as a tourist guide taking care of her teenage son, Ruru Madrid, and her ailing father. Ruru stops schooling and works in the city to help their family, even if Irma is against it.

The third story stars Max Collins and Orlando Sol as sweethearts who both dream of a better life. Orlando is sent to college by his family to be a seaman, but he’s not that bright and keeps on flunking. Max works in a resort and meets a wealthy foreigner who offers to marry her. Will she give up Orlando for a better life abroad with a rich husband? We tell Direk Maryo that his film seems to be the most wholesome among the entries we’ve seen so far, since both “Lihis” and “Tag-araw ni Twinkle” have hot love scenes.

“I want a movie na puede talaga sa mga bata. I intend to enter this in international filmfest for children’s films, just like my ‘Magnifico’ which won best picture abroad. Very Filipino rin ang situations and sentiments shown in ‘Bamboo Flowers’.”